ArticlePloS one2008
Multigene phylogeny of choanozoa and the origin of animals.
Article in PloS one, 2008. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 114 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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Who cites it
114 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 272 citations in OpenAlex.
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- The Hippo kinase cascade regulates a contractile cell behavior and cell density in a close unicellular relative of animals.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2024Article
- The first embryo, the origin of cancer and animal phylogeny. II. The neoplastic process as an evolutionary engine.Journal of biosciences · 2024Article
- Regulation of immune cell development, differentiation and function by stromal Notch ligands.Current opinion in cell biology · 2023Review
- Structural basis and evolution of the photosystem I-light-harvesting supercomplex of cryptophyte algae.The Plant cell · 2023Article
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- Evolutionary reversion in tumorigenesis.Frontiers in oncology · 2023Review
- Structure and evolution of neuronal wiring receptors and ligands.Developmental dynamics : an official publication of the American Association of Anatomists · 2023Review
- Article
54 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
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Authors and funding
7 authors at 2 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Animals are evolutionarily related to fungi and to the predominantly unicellular protozoan phylum Choanozoa, together known as opisthokonts. To establish the sequence of events when animals evolved from unicellular ancestors, and understand those key evolutionary transitions, we need to establish which choanozoans are most closely related to animals and also the evolutionary position of each choanozoan group within the opisthokont phylogenetic tree. Here we focus on Ministeria vibrans, a minute bacteria-eating cell with slender radiating tentacles. Single-gene trees suggested that it is either the closest unicellular relative of animals or else sister to choanoflagellates, traditionally considered likely animal ancestors. Sequencing thousands of Ministeria protein genes now reveals about 14 with domains of key significance for animal cell biology, including several previously unknown from deeply diverging Choanozoa, e.g. domains involved in hedgehog, Notch and tyrosine kinase signaling or cell adhesion (cadherin). Phylogenetic trees using 78 proteins show that Ministeria is not sister to animals or choanoflagellates (themselves sisters to animals), but to Capsaspora, another protozoan with thread-like (filose) tentacles. The Ministeria/Capsaspora clade (new class Filasterea) is sister to animals and choanoflagellates, these three groups forming a novel clade (filozoa) whose ancestor presumably evolved filose tentacles well before they aggregated as a periciliary collar in the choanoflagellate/sponge common ancestor. Our trees show ichthyosporean choanozoans as sisters to filozoa; a fusion between ubiquitin and ribosomal small subunit S30 protein genes unifies all holozoa (filozoa plus Ichthyosporea), being absent in earlier branching eukaryotes. Thus, several successive evolutionary innovations occurred among their unicellular closest relatives prior to the origin of the multicellular body-plan of animals.
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